Germany that year the magistrates went so far in protecting Dürer's "Proportion " as to restrain another work of the same title and subject, presumably though mis-takenly inferred to be an adaptation or imitation, until after the completion and sale of the original work. In 1532 reëngravings of some of Dürer's works were restrained, and when a Latin edition of his "Perspective," printed in Paris, found its way to Nuremberg, the magistrates called the booksellers together, warned them against keeping or selling the unauthorized edition, and sent letters to the magis-tracy of Strasburg, Frankfort, Leipzig and Antwerp, requesting similar action. Luther in his reforming zeal was the first protestant against authors' wrongs, and in a letter of 1528 complained that "there are many now busying themselves with the spoiling of books through misprinting them," and pleaded for legislation to protect literary producers. In 1531 the city council of Basel enjoined all booksellers from reprinting the books of each other for three years from publication under penalty of one hundred gulden, which illustrates the nature of local legislation, priv-ileging printers as well as other guilds within a city. The protection was usually for short terms and some- times covered the subject as well as the book, as indi-cated in the Dürer case.
The coördinate jurisdiction of imperial and local authority continued into the seventeenth century, and besides a special protection of official publications, including church texts and school books, there developed a differentiation between privileged books and protected authors. The imperial city of Frank-fort in 1660 passed an ordinance for the protection of "bücher" and "autores," and an imperial patent of 1685 made the curious distinction between "priv-ileged" and "unprivileged" works, which Pütter,
